LAHORE: The Pakistan Cricket Board has appointed retired Justice Fazal-e-Miran Chauhan as the independent adjudicator for hearing former Test captain Saleem Malik’s appeal in the case concerning the April 2000 conversation transcripts provided by the International Cricket Council.

Though the 57-year-old Salim has responded to the allegation twice, the PCB did not accept his stance and now it has appointed Fazal, who previously worked as Justice of the Lahore High Court, to settle the issue under its specified system.

Though the case is related to developments occurred 20 years ago, it first surfaced in 2011 when then PCB chairman Ijaz Butt appointed Salim in the National Cricket Academy after the life ban imposed on Salim by the Malik Mohammad Qayyum Commission in 2000 in a match-fixing/betting case was lifted by a civil court in 2008.

The ICC sent the transcript to the PCB when Ijaz took the decision as he reverted to take back the appointment of Salim. However, during the last nine years the PCB did not go under its specific system to deal with the case through an independent adjudicator.

Published in Dawn, September 15th, 2020